will stop for wildlife

It's snowing outside our window, and we're pretty darn excited. While most of the East Coast and Midwest has been hammered with snow (sorry, Kinz!), we're still waiting on our big storm. And we need it, boy do we need it. So far there's just a light dusting of powder on the ground, but we're hoping it will continue on through the night.

Yesterday we signed up for an employee-only tour to West Yellowstone. The newest addition to the winter fleet of vehicles here in the park is the Glaval;


transportation decided to do a test run with it, and we signed up to go on the tour. We took off around 8:30 a.m. and headed towards West. We didn't get far--to Fairy Falls--before we ran into a bison jam on the road.


The normal employee runs to West don't stop, but because this was a test run for a normal tour we stopped at points along the way, and for wildlife. We pulled off at Midway Geyser Basin and checked out Fountain Paint Pots


and Rusty Spouter.


Alongside the boardwalk you'll spot these boulders, which are actually remnants of the old road that ran through the geyser basin.


Because this was a tour, we only had about an hour in West once we arrived, just enough time to hit the post office, grocery store, and grab lunch before we headed back into the park.

Despite combing every inch of the Madison valley that we could see, we didn't spot any wolves or bobcats, just a small herd of elk resting by the shore of the river. Our next stop was Firehole Canyon drive, where we saw a few more elk, and also Firehole Cascade


And by popular demand (ahem), more coyote pictures! To my delight, we also pulled over and watched these two mousing along Madison River for about ten minutes.

who dat

One of the most often asked questions as guests arrive here is "Where is the TV?" There isn't one. We haven't seen TV since we arrived (our internet connection is too slow to even stream it), and Steve was getting a little nervous about the Superbowl.

But then we found out that the only TV shown here for the whole winter season is the Superbowl--they get a screen and host a party in employee pub (employees only, shh). The only snafu? We work on Sunday's. Luckily Steve has an AWESOME wife who gave him the day off, so he was set.

Sunday morning dawned sunny and clear--it's been beautiful having these brilliant blue skies, but it means it's still not snowing. Sigh.



We kicked off Sunday Funday with a ski around the geyser basin. It was cold enough that the steam from the geysers and thermal features was frozen in the air above



I saw my favorite coyote cruising the boardwalk near Grand Geyser, and small herd of bison were grazing in the sun in front of the gas station



We skied over to Biscuit Basin to look for the bobcat (no dice), and arrived just as Rusty Geyser was erupting


A lone bison was resting along the banks of the Firehole, obviously gearing himself up for the big game



After lunch, I headed over to work and Steve to the pub. In addition to showing the game, they had a whole spread laid out for everyone: wings, brats, hot dogs, dips, chips, cheesecake, etc. Steve saved me a chair and I skied over for my dinner, and while I missed the game (and the commercials!), I did get the good grub. Though I don't recommend eating wings and then jumping back on skis; the two do not go together.

cupcakes and coyotes

I love cupcakes. A lot. I miss cupcakes. A lot. So today when we popped over to the ranger station and someone had just-so-happened to make cupcakes, I was jumping for joy. Chocolate-mocha cupcakes with dark chocolate frosting. Lots of dark chocolate frosting. Oh how I've missed cupcakes...

Today was my day to come in to work late, and I decided to take the long way, around the geyser basin. The sky was an interesting combination of bright and dark blue


As I came around the corner near the gas station/general store I saw a coyote dart across the path in front of me, out sight. I paused for a moment and then noticed that there was a second coyote, and he was watching the first one run off


All of a sudden he turned his back to me (unfortunately!) and started howling and barking. His howls were answered by the other (still out of site) coyote.





This went out for about a minute, and then as quick as it began he turned on his heels and ran off.


I know Steve says I have enough photos of coyotes, but I don't plan on stopping any time soon.


The Gibbon wolf pack was also spotted this morning, headed south, in this direction. We'll see if they're just passing through or if they'll spend any time in the area.

bison! bison! bison!

On Sunday we decided to ski out to Biscuit Basin. I know we've been whining about the lack of snow, but we really mean it

The trail was slick and icy (from lack of snow!), and a herd of bison had also trampled through the middle of the ski trail. Not ideal ski conditions, to say the least.

When we reached the top of the hill we saw Artemisia Geyser erupt; it sounded like ocean waves pounding the sand.


No wolves at Biscuit Basin, but there was a very active herd of bison that we watched for about an hour.





Steve left yesterday for Mammoth, and I had an hour to kill between when he left on the snowcoach and when I needed to be at work. I decided to take a short walk up to Observation Hill--from the top of the hill I could see a few bison moving around,


including this guy, who was rolling around on the (snow-less) ground)


I checked my watch and decided to head back to the Snow Lodge and to work. As soon I got to the bottom of the hill I found that the bison were now blocking the trail.


I backed up slowly, and decided the best thing to do would be to try and wait them out, from afar. But after a few minutes a big bull climbed up on the trail and told me to move along. This picture is out of focus because I decided to move immediately, as instructed.


I backed up the trail even further and took a few shots of this squirrel while I waited.


The bison seemed to be moving into Geyser Hill, and off the trail, to the right. But that's when I noticed two bison on my left, and knew the only choice now was to climb back up Observation Hill and exit on the other side.

It was getting close to 3 p.m., starting time, so I hurried back up the hill, past Solitary Geyser, and down to the boardwalk. Only when I reached the end of the boardwalk I found that they were now grazing there, and there was no way to exit . Thwarted again, I had to take the boardwalk all the down to Castle Geyser and then back up towards the Snow Lodge. All in all, an hour--and 1.5 mile--detour. And that's when I realized that this is probably the only place in the world where "I'm sorry I'm late for work, I was trapped by a herd of bison!" is a plausible excuse.

Adding to the excitement around here, this morning I felt my first earthquake. Around 9:45 a.m. I was reading in bed and I felt my bed shake a little, as if someone had jiggled the bedframe. I had no idea what it was (I even looked underneath the bed!) until Steve called to ask me if I'd felt anything. He'd heard on the radio that we're in day 3 of "swarms," but I hadn't felt anything prior to this.

Today I'll hop on the snowcoach and meet Steve up in Mammoth. He went up a day early and is fishing one of the spring creeks south of Livingston this afternoon. We'll spend tonight and tomorrow night out at the Buffalo Ranch in the Lamar Valley, before returning to Old Faithful on Thursday.

geyser gazing

Today we got up early to join one of the park rangers for their geyser prediction circuit. Each morning a ranger goes out to the basin to check heat sensors located near many of the geysers that help determine when the geysers went off so that the rangers can predict when they will erupt again.

Our ski journey started with a short cut through the woods that had us following a slew of coyote tracks. And not only were there footprints in the snow, the coyotes had also left scent markings, some which contained blood, a sure sign that mating season is around the corner, or so said the ranger.

That first geyser we came to was Castle, which was steamy but pretty quiet

The ranger carefully walked along the run-off canal and downloaded the information in the heat sensor into a portable drive that allowed her to transfer the readings into a laptop. A spike in the water temperature reading will indicate when the geyser last went off and allow for an accurate prediction of its next eruption.

We continued to follow the coyote tracks

up past Grand Geyser, which the ranger predicted erupted about 20 minutes before arrival, which was a bit of disappointment since it is the tallest predictable geyser (it goes off once of twice a day) in the world. While passing Chromatic Spring the ranger pointed out dead thermophiles, which created the pink layer around the feature.

Thermophiles are organisms that thrive in the superheated springs and thermals of Yellowstone. They create all the vibrant colors in many of the springs and are of constant interest to science. For instance, thermophilic bacteria is the basis of DNA fingerprinting and many scientists wonder if, given their ability live in liquid and survive at extreme temps, thermophiles weren't the first life forms on earth. The latter has also made them a favorite of NASA since they believe studying thermophiles might give them a leg up on finding life on other planets like Mars.

Next we passed Grotto Geyser, which wasn't doing too much, and Giant Geyser, which hasn't erupted since February, on our way to Riverside Geyser. True to its name, Riverside sits right on the Firehole River and erupts every 6 hours or so.

To many people it looks like a toilet and you can tell it is ready to erupt when the bowl on the right fills with water and starts to overflow.

Making our way back along the trail we could see some steam rising and sure enough we caught Grotto as it was doing its thing

After checking out the eruption we headed over to Daisy, where the ranger once again checked out the sensor, peaked into the geyser to gauge the water level and then radioed in her prediction on its next eruption.

From there we headed toward Geyser Hill and past Grand, Wave Spring (if you look close you can see the constant ripple)

and Sawmill Geyser. In the distance we could see Lion Geyser going off and Old Faithful start to steam as we skied along the icy track and up the hill.

Over by Pump Geyser, the ranger pointed out where a bison had walked across the bacterial mat and left a trail in the layer of bacteria around the thermal feature.

We reached the top the hill just in time to see Old Faithful start to spout.

Having checked all the geysers and made her predictions, the ranger headed back to the Visitors Center to download her sensor information. We went back the way we came and reached Sawmill just as it was boiling over

The run-off from Sawmill passed by Wendie's favorite thermal feature, Scalloped Spring,

and down into the Firehole River (check how little snow there is)

Having completed both our physical and educational quota for the day we decided to follow the coyote's love trail and head back home.

Later, as we were heading home from a slow day at work, we heard a couple coyotes yipping and barking, obviously saying that their night would be more exciting than ours was.

(Further Reading: There was a story in USA Today that mentioned the Yellowstone Association and one of the guides we work with. Check it out. )